Increasing your website’s search ranking helps you get found in online search, build authority for your site and drive more traffic.
What can artists do to increase traffic to their websites? One of the biggest drivers of traffic is search, and having your website link show up in online searches can help. Search engine optimization techniques include using keywords, and updating content frequently – but one of the easiest ways to help increase your website ranking is by gaining backlinks.
Backlinks are links that from other websites to your art website. The more highly ranked the other site, the more “link juice” it provides. Google’s search engine likes to see backlinks that come from authoritative websites, which serves to distinguish yours as worthy of a visit as well.
Getting press from blogs and news sites is a great way to build strong backlinks. And writing guest articles on blogs can be very helpful as well. But what if you don’t have the time or desire to pursue either of those options?
You can create your own backlinks by contributing to websites that have high rankings and allow publication. Here are a few suggestions of sites that can give backlinks to your art website:
Quora
This is a Q&A website where experts provide information on many topics. It also gives you the opportunity to create a profile and write a blog post on any subject of your choosing. Share some of your expertise, or your artist story. Provide information for people interested in your medium. And, include a link to your website in your post.
BoredPanda
This is a popular and fun site with lots of creative content. If your art is really interesting (as it most likely is!) you can create a free account here and write about it. Use lots of photos and link to your art website. Readers can vote articles up or down, and the ones that get the most votes gain more exposure. Using a captivating title for your article will really help grab attention on this site.
Medium
A highly-ranked site that encourages you to self-publish articles on any topic, and include photos, which is a perfect vehicle for visual artists and makers. Stories that get lots of “hearts” and shares may end up as Top Stories. Eye Candy and Editor’s Picks are also categories that can spread your article to lots of readers. Don’t forget to add that link to your website to drive traffic and help your ranking.
Buzzfeed
Join this community and write an article including a link to your site, then click “Suggest” to the editors of Buzzfeed. If chosen, your post will be published on their community platform.
Viral Nova
This website invites submissions, suggesting that they are looking for “photographers’ galleries, compelling content and everyday occurrences that deserve attention.” Include photos of your work, or even videos to add interest, and include a backlink to your site.
You may already have a profile on this business-related networking site. Did you know that you can write articles there as well? Include photos or videos, and information about yourself as an artist, your work, technique, inspiration, etc. – plus your website link.
As you create backlinks to your website, your website ranking should increase, although it may take a couple of weeks before the links are indexed by Google and you see results. You can also keep track of backlinks and site ranking by using a service like Alexa, which offers lots of useful analytic tools.
Very useful article. Just wanted to add something – you should get as many dofollow links as you can. While nofollow links are good on popular sites because you’ll get people clicking on them and thus drive traffic to your site, they add no value to your rank on Google. If you’re not sure whether a link to your site is dofollow or nofollow, there are browser add-ons that can help.
Great suggestion Eliza! It is important for artists (and anyone with a website) to know the difference between dofollow and nofollow.
Thanks for a great source of sites and thanks to you Eliza for a great tip.
Just to clarify DoFollow and NoFollow, most links are DoFollow by default…. correct? A no follow link would have rel=nofollow in the link (which naturally we wouldn’t type in but may be added by other sites that backlink?)
Am I correct in my thoughts here?
Yes, Mark you are correct about most links being DoFollow. Sometimes when you get press (for example at a highly ranked site) they are specific about having NoFollow links, but will drive traffic to your site. However, you might be interested in this article about getting SEO value out of NoFollow links https://moz.com/blog/seo-value-nofollow-links
Best practice is to have an even balance of nofollow and dofollow backlinks. Google loves this as it appears the most natural.
Great resource. Back-links are not always easy, I had no idea about LinkedIn, really appreciate the tips. I also completely agree with Eliza on the importance of dofollow links
Creating back links is very important factor to rank in Google search results. A website should create both do follow and no follow back links to gain traffic and authority in search results and have a better position in the internet world
So helpful thanks or putting this together. 🙂
thanks for this useful post
Very useful article especially for the newcomers like me. I think this will help me for making some good quality backlinks. Thanks for sharing the information
Very useful article especially for the newcomers like me. I think this will help me for making some good quality backlinks. Thanks for sharing the information.
Well written article with some great nuggets. Whilst I believe they’re set to nofollow I wanted to suggest Pintrest to drive organic traffic. No doubt there’s some stiff competition, but with over 450 million monthly visits (many of which may share content to their own sites/blogs) there’s certainly potential there. And as another comment mentions, nofollow links help keep a healthy balance of link distribution in the serps.
Great resources for creating backlinks. Unfortunately, BuzzFeed might delete your posts for no reason so I would suggest Reddit instead. At least from reddit, you will get do-follow links that will help improve your website’s SEO rank. Besides, there are large communities for artists, crafts, and literally any niche that you can join and promote your artwork.
Fantastic advice and thanks to the contributors. certainly got me thinking of an article to write and see what happens on my traffic. using Wix platform and GA4 currently to track performance.
Great suggestion Eliza! It is important for artists (and anyone with a website) to know the difference between do follow and nofollow.
This was very helpful. Thanks for this info!
Great tips! Backlinks really do make a difference. Love the idea of using Bored Panda and LinkedIn for more reach—definitely trying these out!